Health Anxiety in Children: Development and Psychometric Properties of the Childhood Illness Attitude Scales

Abstract

The course of severe anxiety surrounding health issues is unknown. The available literature suggests that adults who are overly anxious about health issues often interpret or misinterpret their bodily signs and symptoms to be indicative of a serious illness. The construct of health anxiety has not been examined in children and, to date, there has not been an instrument developed for this purpose. The Illness Attitude Scales is one of the most commonly used instruments for evaluating fears, beliefs, and attitudes that are associated with hypochondriasis and abnormal illness behaviour in adults. We sought to adapt the Illness Attitude Scales for use with children ages 8-15 years. The adapted Illness Attitude Scales was renamed the Childhood Illness Attitude Scales. Revisions to the adult version consisted of simplification of language, revision of Likert scale (i.e. 5-point to 3-point scale), and the addition of 7 questions to evaluate the role parents/guardians play in facilitating medical attention or treatment. Correlations between Childhood Illness Attitude Scales total scores and other self-report measures were supportive of the construct-related validity of the Childhood Illness Attitude Scales and suggested that it is a useful measure of health anxiety in school-age children. Practical and theoretical implications of the present results are discussed.

Health Anxiety in Preadolescence - Associated Health Problems, Healthcare Expenditure, and Continuity in Childhood

“…The total score thus rests on 33 items (score range 33-99). The CIAS has shown high test-retest (10-14 days) reliability, r=0.86, and a high internal consistency, α=0.88, as well as significant associations between CIAS total scores and measures of similar constructs like childhood anxiety sensitivity (Wright and Asmundson 2003;Wright and Asmundson 2005). For the present study, with permission of the authors, the CIAS was translated to Danish using the backtranslation strategy for cross-cultural research.…”

“…Participants who endorsed an elevated number of physical symptoms also scored significantly higher on seven of the IAS subscales. These observations were supported in the later study on school children by Wright and Asmundson (2003) who developed and tested the Childhood Illness Attitude Scales (CIAS), a modified version of the IAS to be used for children aged 8-15 years. The adaptations included language simplification, a simplified rating scale, and seven additional items to evaluate child help-seeking behavior from parents with regard to medical attention or treatment.…”

“…It is a 35-item self-report measure evaluating fears, beliefs, and attitudes associated with HA and abnormal illness behaviors in school-age children (Wright and Asmundson 2003). The standard measure has no time focus and most items are rated on a 3-point rating scale (1=none of the time, 2=sometimes, 3=a lot of the time).…”

The Illness Attitude Scales

“…Wright et al [172, 173] developed and validated a version of the IAS adapted for use with school-age children (8–15 years old) and named Childhood Illness Attitude Scales.…”

Primary school students' opinions about the competences of physical education teachers: The role of gender, age and training

“…Odgovori su varirali od 1 -ne slažem se, preko 2 -nisam siguran, do odgovora 3 -slažem se. U originalnom upitniku skala procene je petostepena, ali je u ovom istraži-vanju redukovana na trostepenu usled preporuka Mellora i Moorove (Mellor & Moor, 2014), kao i Wrightove i Asmundsona (Wright & Asmundson, 2003) koje idu u prilog zaključku da je trostepena skala adekvatnija za odgovaranje kod dece u dobi do 14 godina. Originalan upitnik ne sadrži supskale, već samo ukupan skor kao meru stavova učenika prema nastavniku fizičkog vaspitanja, njegovim kompetencijama i prema nastavi tog predmeta.…”